To day I have not been doing so well. I have been reading a lot of research, but I have not been good at writing a summary and sharing what I learned. This may sound like a failure, but because I was using social media to start the challenge it turns out it hasn't been. This is because some other amazing nurses took up the challenge and actually have been doing this [See Nursing and the World, Toronto Emerg, Nurse Story, Nursetopia].

This is just one example of how social media can build and develop professionalism. Now that I'm starting to reflect on the project, I really like what others have added to the challenge. For example other have used good headings to make their posts easy to read. I took and adapted @JoniWaton's and now I'm using it for when I read an article in Mendeley - hopefully using these criteria will help make it easier to post updates online too. Here are the ones I plan to use:

The Article: 
Big Idea:
Evidence:
Quotable:
So What?

This is a screenshot of how I read my articles incase anyone wondered. I like reading digital. I lose paper copies of articles and the notes with them. If anyone has a great system or just one that works well for them I'd love to hear about it! Always trying to find better systems for reading and organize my research.

Back to why I originally started this post. Time is scarce and no one person can do everything. That is the beauty of what technology can do, allow other to contribute and collaborate. In that end, I never wanted the Nursing Research Challenge to be a me or Nursing Ideas thing. I just wanted other nurses to read more research and to share the great articles we come across. After a brief email conversation about that with Joni Watson we've decided it could be expanded and built upon in the future, and we already have some ideas. However, that does not mean that we own it we'd like you ideas and if you want your participation would be welcome too. Feel free to get in touch or leave a comment if you are interested, and here is to celebrating the advancement of the profession.

This week have been reading articles about wound care documentation, and photographic wound documentation. I really enjoyed a quote in one of them, that relates to why I wanted to work on a mobile phone applications for wound documentation, but more about that later. So this week the article is:

Bradshaw, L. M., Specialist, P. C., Wound, C., Services, O., Valley, L., Network, H., et al. (2012). Collaboration in Wound Photography Competency Development : A Unique Approach. Advances, (February 2011), 85-92.

Overview: This article provides insight into how a 988-bed magnet hospital developed a wound photography competency. After reviewing the literature, current standards, and clinical practice they developed recommendations for ensuring that all staff using the camera for documentation were well trained.

Favourite Quote: "wound photographs translate written assessment from abstract concept to visual image." (p. 86) I've seen wounds that take two hours to change the dressing, and the charting to go with it include three different sheets on various clipboards, and then narrative notes that range from a few sentences to half a page. This sentence made me understand why I was not satisfied with narrative notes, there is such great variation. Just incase a non-nurse is reading this, look at the picture below and try to simply describe it, surprisingly hard.

Take home: Nurses need to take part in continually improving our documentation standards. Photo documentation offers some of these possibilities.

So far I have two people joining in the research challenge, and it is not to late if you want to take part.

• J Doe - 1 article a week
• Terri Schmitt - 1 article a week

One of the great parts about having others take part in the challenge is that it is pushing me to catch up. I have been doing more reading this semester, but they are for my classes and I have not been writing them up. I am still sharing some via Mendeley, but Terri and J Doe both beat me to publishing summaries of articles. So here is my first one:

Hiestand, W. C. (2000). Think different: Inventions and innovations by Nurses, 1850-1950. October, 100(10), 72-77.

This is not a typical "research" paper, meaning it was not using quantitative or qualitative research methods. However, it was a paper I found when researching a keynote speech for the Canadian Nursing Students' Association's National Conference. The paper gives uses interesting historical anecdotes to illustrate how nurses have been involved with innovation and developing technology.

There are numerous cases that they draw upon. From the first simulation mannequins in 1911 to the less successful "sexual armor" that was created in 1908 to restrain children from the evils of masturbation. Not every invention is a success, however the article does illustrate how nurses have a long standing history of taking part in innovation and making medical devices work. I liked this article because it was a refreshing lesson and one that is often lost, especially in the digital age of innovation. Hopefully this article will entertain and help to illustrate nurses role in development and creation of new technology.

My goal is to blog one day a week with an update on the challenge and to share what I read. The hope is that I will do this one day of the week, and I'm going to try and choose a specific day to force myself to be consistent. However, if I really want follow through with this goal I am going to need some encouragement, but more importantly I am hoping to find partners in crime. If you are interested sign up below for what your goal for keeping up with research is and how you will share it. I'm going to post a list at the end of the month with whoever signs up. That way we can keep tabs on each other and possibly share around good articles. I will also be using Mendeley, to share the article in this group feel free to join.

The best part about Google Translate, is that it not only helps you get a C+ in you spanish class, take it from me. It can do basic translation of a webpage– and allows you to click through it– in a matter of seconds.

Taking a website that looks like this:

And with the click of magical a button (Chrome Extension), or by entering a URL on Google Translate a:

It turns to english.

Now the beauty of this, is you can translate between a range of language options. So if you are not a native english speaker you can translate from Spanish to French, or Germany, or any of the other listed languages.

Now, what really got me excited about this was not only can you do this for simple sentences and now webpages, you can also do this for a websites RSS feed. So when you are reading your latest news, Google will slip in a spanish websites latest posts.

And again, with an easy click option to translate

Your newest feed source seamlessly slips itself into your news items in a language you can read.

Although, I do not for a minute suggest learning languages is no longer necessary. It is amazing how this can be used to at least increase exchange of ideas and dialogue.

The optimistic side of me wonders how useful this might be for immigrants and non-native language speakers for using government and healthcare resources in their community. I would love to see any research anyone has on the quality of translation and the usefulness of such a feature.

Rafael sent me this message on Saturday:

Thankfully due to Google Translate I can read and appreciate what he is writing about. Incredible to think the small impact of starting a website in 2008 can amplify into this sort of result years later. The website is not identical to Nursing Ideas, it is his own version. One that shares the values of improving and increasing the way that ideas are shared and valued in nursing.

Never once have I been to Colombia, yet somehow he found my website and was inspired. For all the times I have tried to answer the 'so what', 'why do you have a blog' or 'how many hits do you get' question at conferences, over and over again this is the intangible effect of a website. This may be the only website that Nursing Ideas inspires, but hopefully many more people are impacted by the videos, unfortunately the numbers don't count that.

The second thing that happened this weekend was a Facebook message from a Teresa. We met for a conference she was part of, and I was able to help her out by being interviewed. After, or possibly before, the skype interview we got to chatting about her work too. It was incredible to talk with her about the projects she had been doing, and I asked her when she was going to start putting her thoughts and projects online. We also ranted about how much of what educators are doing is on the intranet, behind the firewall of the hospital. Back to the facebook message, she recently launched her own website Nursing Staff Development: Behind the Firewall. Amazing to hear that she is finally online, and feeling part of push that got her there and generated the name was great too.

Nursing Ideas and most of the work I take part in has never about following the Rob Fraser model for online this or that. If anything I hope you never do what I do -you could put me out of business - the goal of Nursing Ideas is to encourage nurses and nursing students to become passionate, engaged, and hopefully to take action.

Dr Nancy Walton - @researchEthics

Ryerson University

Associate Professor - Daphne Cockwell School of Nursing
Chair - Research Ethics Board

As many nurses begin to learn about patient care and research the topic of ethics comes up, or at least it should. In this interview I sit down with Nancy Walton, a nurse that found her love for ethics while pursuing her graduate education. She was the Associate Director at Ryerson University in 2009 and is the chair of their Research Ethics board. As an ethicist and a nurse Nancy understand difficulties that both sides encounter when they met. That said she is passionate about helping nurses to understand and use ethical reason to solve situations that arise in patient care and to plan their research. Although her career track to tenure has the traditional list of publications and academic work she is also using more accessible methods of writing through her website Research Ethics. In this interview we talk about her work, the importance of ethics for nursing, how nurses can get more involved and learn more about ethics.

Resources

• Joint Centre for Bioethics
• Research Ethics Blog
• Nursing Ethics - Codes of Ethics
• College of Nurses - Practice Standard Ethics
• Nursing Ethics (wikipedia)
• Institutional Review Board (IRB) Blog

Questions

Dr Nancy Walton RN: What do you feel would help you to further engage with ethics? How can educators and ethicists make it more accessible?

Rob Fraser RN: Have you ever taken ethics training? How was ethics taught to you?

May 31, 2010 Toronto's St Michael's Hospital showcased the Research Advancing Practice's (RAP) [2009 PDF] latest cohort. The program involves a group of frontline nurses that enroll in a program that gives them to time to learn and conduct research. Behind the program is Dr. Lianne Jeffs (see Lianne Jeff's Nursing Ideas interview here) and takes in nurses like Martha Schroder (her interview here). The program is fantastic on so many levels, it promotes a culture of learning, allows nurses to improve the workplace, job satisfaction is enhanced and most importantly the research focuses on improving patient care!

When I heard the date for these presentations was announced I marked off my calendar I knew I wanted to go, but when I got there there was something different. This year the nursing RAP (what a great name!) had a new abbreviation, the RAPpers (as they are called) took part in RAP-CD (career development). During the opening remarks it was explained that Janice Waddell had been working on integrating the Donner-Wheeler career visioning into the program. Although at first glance it might not appear a large addition. Career development is not a new topic, but to nursing the incorporation of CD into a program that is already doing incredible things this addition is very significant. Nurses that participate expresses a number of positive outcomes, and one of those is an interest in further education. When nurses are given the opportunity to learn, conduct research, and improve patient care it really improves they way they view their role in the hospital, including the CD ensures that nurses not only consider further education but also their future career.

Watching the nurses talk about their experiences, research, and what they hope to do in the future was inspiring. Rarely on walking into a hospital is it possible to walk into a room of energized nurses talking about how excited they are, how the organization is supporting them, and creating future dreams about what they would like to do. Below are some pictures from the day, I highly encourage you to take a look, consider if your organization might be able to do something similar, and finally to remember that nurses are the frontline of healthcare delivery, which gives us the best perspective to come up with great research questions.

The RAP-CD initiative is a fantastic idea. I truly encourage every nurse and nursing organization to consider if this is a possibility. Creating dynamic programs like RAP-CD create amazing opportunities to support employees and improve patient care!

Sioban Nelson PhD

Dean and Professor - Lawrence S Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing

After starting the MN at the University of Toronto, I have had a few readings from Sioban about understanding the history of Nursing. These articles really helped my understanding of nursing. Being young in the profession this historical analysis helps to ground and better understand nursing. During this episode we talked about Dr Nelson's background and how she integrated her understanding of historical analysis into her academic work.

Links

• Nursing (wikipedia) Timeline of Nursing
• Sioban's latest book: Complexities of Care

Research

• Nelson, S. & Gordon, S. (2004). The rhetoric of rupture: Nursing as a practice with a history? September/October Nursing Outlook, 52, 255-261.
• Nelson, S. (1997). Reading nursing history. Nursing Inquiry, 4: 229-236.
• Nelson, S. & McGillion, M. (2004) Expertise or performance? Questioning the rhetoric of contemporary narrative use in nursing, Journal of Advanced Nursing. 47(6).

Question

• Robert Fraser: How have you learned about nursing history? Do you understand how it might give you insight into the profession?

Dr Mary Jane Esplen RN

Clinician Scientist and Professor - University of Toronto

Area of expertise: Psychosocial Oncology

Dr Mary Jane Esplen has an extensive career in clinical oncology practice that has evolved over the years to include research as major part of her role. Her ability to drive research strongly tied to clinical practice and how she managed to stay in both academia and practice is part of what we talk about. More recently she has been appointed Director of the de Souza Institute for nursing oncology knowledge transfer for the province, and is planning to take this international. We discuss how her career evolved, why she loves psychosocial oncology and how others might learn from her experience.

Research

• Some of Mary Jane's research Search Results
• Quality of Life Tools for adult patients with cancer undergoing chemotherapy
• Literature Search: Body Image + Cancer
• Profile: Jimmie Holland MD - Pscyho Oncology
• Effects of psychological interventions on survival of patients with metastatic breast cancer

Other

• Definition of Nursing Intervention Model
• Research profile of Mary Jane
• Dr David Spiegel - Psychosocial Researcher
• de Souza Intitute
• Canadian Partnership Against Cancer
• Oncology Nursing Society

Questions:

Mary Jane Esplen: What is the impact of new technologies on practice? Who should be involved in helping families involve these technologies? How can they change clinical practice? What can my role be in this?

Rob Fraser: Are you seeing cancer starting to come into your area of practice? Are you aware of the research that is happening in oncology and how it might improve your practice?

Lianne Jeffs RN, PhD(c)

Director Nursing & Clinical Research

Research Scientist - Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute

In her current role at she contributes globally to evolving patient safety science as her program area of research is patient safety. Her work focuses on the generating knowledge on the design and delivery of safer health-care systems. In this interview we talk about the Research Advancing Practice initiative that was start at St Michael's Hospital to get clinical nurses to start generating research relevant to their areas of practice

Links

• Research and Reflection for RAP artists (2009) The Standard. College of Nurses of Ontario.
• The art and science of caring
• RNAO Leadership Award in Nursing Research - Lianne Jeffs Research Advancing Practice

Research

• Jeffs, L., Smith, O., Wilson, G., Kohn, M., Campbell, H., Maione, M.,
  Tregunno, D. & Ferris, E. (in press). Building Knowledge for Safer Care:
  Nursing Research Advancing Practice. Journal of Nursing Care Quality.
  24(3).
• Fineout-Overholt, E., Melnyk, B., Schultz, A. (2005) Transforming Health Care from the Inside Out: Advancing Evidence-Based Practice in the 21st Century, Journal of Professional Nursing, 21(6), 335-344.
  

Questions

• Lianne: Have you been involved in a similiar process or program? What are the difficulties, challenges and enablers where you are practicing and how do you bring research to your daily work?
• Rob: Do you see yourself as a researcher, and feel a need to contribute to nursing knowledge? If you hospital offered a program like this would you take part?

Hélène Sabourin, RN, BScN, MHA

Links

• The Canadian Nurses Foundation - La Fondation des infirmières et infirmiers du Canada

Question

1. Do you know of any technology that easily allows you to find what research has been done in a particular area, or grants are given out?
2. Have you ever applied for awards or grants? What resources do you feel you need in order to feel comfortable submitting for a research grant?